Chipotle Struggles to Regain Consumer Favor

It’s been a year since Chipotle’s E.coli crisis, and the brand continues to be talked about negatively by consumers.

We analyzed our TotalSocial consumer conversation data for Chipotle during the past year, examining in-depth the restaurant chain’s performance in the “Sentiment” category. Sentiment is a measurement of how positive the conversation is around a brand, both in online social media and offline face-to-face conversations. According to TotalSocial, Chipotle has not regained positive standing among consumers.

Pre-crisis, Chipotle’s Offline Sentiment score was 70, putting the brand among the top quartile on a scale of 0 to 100. As of September, Chipotle was at just 42, well below average. While the brand is gradually coming back on this measure, it still has much to go to regain the sentiment it lost among consumer conversations during the past year.

We’re seeing the same thing with Chipotle’s Online Sentiment score – which measures positive conversations about a brand occurring online. It was at a 49 score pre-crisis, and now is at 37. Chipotle’s Online Sentiment, however, has been more volatile than its Offline Sentiment, seeing bigger increases and decreases over time.

The company has been making efforts to regain consumer interest. Late last month, Chipotle opened its new burger concept restaurant, Tasty Made. We will continue to monitor TotalSocial to see if the company can regain its standing among consumers.

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